The Himalayas are not merely a geographical feature, a range of mountains. they epitomise people's civilisational identity that goes back to the dawn of history. If these majestic mountains were not there, the rain clouds sweeping up from the Indian Ocean.

The Indian Himalaya do not present themselves as one unbroken chain, but rather as a gigantic layer cake made up of several different ranges. The principal Himalayan mountain ranges divide the Indian Sub-continent from the Tibetan Plateau. From Nanga Parbat in the west, these mountains stretch for over 2000 kilometres to the borders of Sikkim and Bhutan in the east.

In Kashmir, the mountain ranges give way to the subsidiary ranges that make up the heart of Kashmir’s lakes and valleys, whilst to the north and east lie Zanskar and Ladakh, commonly referred to as the Trans-Himalaya zone, marking the geological transition between the Indian Sub-continent and the Tibetan Plateau. To the south-east stretch the lower ranges of the Pir Panjal and the Dhaula Dhar which eventually tie in to the high, snow-capped mountains of the Garhwal Himalaya.